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OBSERVATIONS 

1 



DOCTOR STEVENS'S 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 



'What overgrown piece of lumber have we here? cried the curate." 

Don Quixote. 



"''J'of WisKvC^"^^ 



A V ANN AH 

MDCCCXLIX. 



OBSERVATIONS 



DOCTOR STEVENS'S 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA 



A History of Georgia, from its first Discovery by Europeans, to the 
Adoption of the present Constitution, mdccxcviii. By Rev. William 
Bacon Stevens, M.D., Professor of Belles Lettres, History, etc., in the 
University of Georgia, Athens. In two volumes. Vol. I. New York, 
1847. 8yo. pp. 503. 

The Preface of this book announces that it was 
undertaken in the year 1841, and that every facility 
has been afforded for its composition, both by the 
Historical Society, and by private individuals. 

The title-page proclaims its author to be a Pro- 
fessor of Belles Lettres and History, and fixes the 
date of its publication in the year 1847. 

Thus the inferences that it is accurate in state- 
ment and correct in style, are only not suggested. 
Six years would give ample time for frequent and 
deliberate revivsions, for the rectification of mistakes 



4 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS S 

committed in haste, or through negligence, and for 
the removal of any redundancies or improprieties of 
language. Six years did elapse between the com- 
mencement and publication. 

The natural conclusion from the preliminary parade 
of the author's advantages is, that he has availed 
himself of them ; that the volume which he " pre- 
sents" (for and in consideration of the sum of two 
dollars and fifty cents per copy) to "A/s heloved 
state, as an offering of first fruits^ from the harvest 
of her past memorials,"f is, what it ought to be. 
Nor is there any disclaimer offered to repress such 
a conclusion. There is not the slightest appearance 
of a modest diffidence of his own abilities, not a 

* Three pages before this (Preface, p. ix.), we find Doctor Stevens writing 
thus: "Entering a field of enquiry which has been reaped by four prede- 
cessors, I could scarcely expect to do more than glean here and there a sheaf 
which the sickle had spared, or the reaper neglected." As they now stand, 
these two declarations are directly contradictory. One of them must be 
untrue, — or perhaps he has only put the cart before the horse. The figure 
of reaping, &c., is stale enough, — Doctor Stevens, with an originality quite 
ingenious, turns it topsy-turvy. He begins by gleaning with the humility 
of a Ruth after the reapers, and ends with gathering the whole harvest, and 
offering " the first fruits" " to his beloved state," Georgia. Poor Georgia ! 
hers is a woman's name, hers has been a woman's fate ! Trusting — yielding 
— deserted ! To the empty mouth that gave her empty professions she 
returned abundance of food, and seated ignorance in the chair of learning. 
But what in the recipient of her generosity was ungrateful abandonment, 
has been for Georgia a happy deliverance. 

f Preface, p. xii. 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 6 

single admission of imperfection, not a doubt as to 
the adequacy of his powers to his work, not a hint of 
a possibility of its not being immaculate. 

The tone of the Preface is that of presumptuous 
egotism ; the rest of the work is marked by shallow- 
ness and incapacity. We looked for "a thing of 
life," and behold an abortion ! for comeliness, and 
behold a monster ! It is put forward, too, with a 
pert confidence worthy of the hero of nursery re- 
nown : — 

" Little Jack Horner sat in the corner, 
Eating a Christmas pie : 
He put in his thumb, and he took out a plum, 
And said ' What a good boy am I !' " 

Indeed a serene self-satisfaction pervades the whole 
performance. If anything were wanting to complete 
the absurdity of the book, this would do it. Self- 
conceit is ridiculous, and impotence is ridiculous ; 
but united in such proportions as this book exhibits 
— both in such monstrous development — rare! 
For a man to talk nonsense is bad enough ; but to 
talk nonsense with the air of one uttering wisdom — 
vanity can carry folly no farther. 

With equal self-approbation, and equal uncon- 
sciousness of the fantastic figure she cut, did Madge 
Wildfire lead good little Jeanie Deans up the church 



6 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS'S 

aisle before the amazed congregation. But — poor 
Madge was crazed. 

The Preface contains no apology for defects, but 
it gives a reason for introducing this miserable 
bantling of a meretricious muse to our notice. It 
declares the work was written to supply the want, 
long felt, of a history of Georgia. The deficiency 
truly has been remedied. The gap has been filled 
up. But how ? Rags have been stuffed into the 
broken window, and the hole is no longer oj^en. 
The tempest is kept out, but so is the light. 

Yet perhaps 'tis rather fortunate for the Historical 
Society that this book has proved a failure. "Were 
it what it assumes to be, it would have necessarily 
covered the whole ground, and rendered the future 
labours of the Society works of supererogation.* 
Nothing would have remained for that respectable 
association to do, but to hold meetings and elect 
members. The main purpose of its formation being 
accomplished, there would have been little use in 
the protraction of a feeble and languishing existence. 

The completion of an accurate and well-written 
history of Georgia will necessarily be a finishing 
stroke to the Society. It will be the fulfilment of 
its function. If, however, it should survive that 
event, and still linger on, it must degenerate from 

* See Appendix. 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 7 

the dignity of a Society down to a mere club of 
Jonathan Oldbucks. 

With this view, we regard the failure of this 
book as its chiefest merit ; the Society being thereby 
relieved from an unpleasant and probably unforeseen 
predicament — a position of uselessness and insigni- 
ficance. 

Certainly Doctor Stevens's work can never cause 
such a deplorable catastrophe. Instead of a history, 
it is a sort of historical patchwork, in which the 
pieces about Georgia are rather more numerous than 
the others. It abounds, too, in errors as to fact, 
which in the course of our remarks we shall endea- 
vour to expose, and shall not hesitate to rebuke ; 
and is also distinguished for a style so grandilo- 
quent, so preposterous, so pompous, so corrupt, so 
grotesquely incongruous with the simplicity of the 
subject, that every attempt we have made to give 
it serious consideration has ended in a hearty fit 
of laughter. It is difficult to condemn what is so 
delightfully absurd. We have a kindness for its 
very faults — they have afforded us so much merri- 
ment. It is too ridiculous for contempt — we laugh 
and pity. 

The big words about little things — the ambitious 
diction, not unfrequently rising into nonsense — the 
'' laboured nothings" lavished with indiscriminate 



8 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS S 

profusion upon the most trivial occasions — all remind 
US irresistibly of the issue of the famous labour — 

" Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus." 

It is indeed very funny to observe how every sub- 
ject which affords the slightest opening for a burst of 
impassioned loquacity, is relentlessly tortured into 
some relation with the history of Georgia — how the 
meagre theme of our early annals has been expanded 
into a volume competent to contain an ancient 
empire's story — how the simple, dry details have 
been bedizened with rhetorical decorations, like an 
old, enduring dowager's withered phiz set about with 
flowers, till we are revolted at a contrast which 
makes dryness seem drier, ugliness more hideous, 
and even bloom repulsive. 

But not even this is quite so amusing as the 
self-satisfaction evinced throughout the book, the 
triumphant air with which the nonsense is produced, 
and the conviction, everywhere apparent, that this 
" fine writing" will achieve for the author his coveted 
literary immortality. 

The frequent repetition of these tropes and figures, 
however, diminishes the amusement to be derived 
from them ; they cease to be diverting, and become 
tiresome. The reader is at last fatigued by the 
eternal glitter, though it be but the glitter of tinsel. 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 9 

and he is palled and sickened by the exuberant flow 
of an insipid and ornate twaddle. 

Mr. Diedrich Knickerbocker commences his cele- 
brated History of New York with an account of the 
creation of the world — his first book " containing 
divers ingenious theories and philosophic specula- 
tions concerning the creation and population of the 
world, as connected with the history of New York." 

Doctor Stevens has not sufficient hardihood to 
ascend to quite so remote a period, but contents 
himself with beginning with the discovery of Ame- 
rica. He accordingly devotes his first book to an 
account of early voyages to the southern coast gene- 
rally, and of settlements in Florida and S(mth Caro- 
lina; diversified by digressions which carry him as 
far South as the ruins of Central America, and into 
discussions respecting their probable origin and the 
character of the inscriptions upon them ; in the course 
of which we are indulged with a good deal of stuff 
about Echo — gigantic columns — halls of banqueting 
— silent chambers — Shemitic art — and so forth. All 
of which, digressions about Central America, narra- 
tives of Spanish settlements in Florida, and of 
French settlements in Carolina, no doubt throw 
great light on the history of Georgia ! 

This first book also contains a short notice of 
2 



10 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS S 

the Indians; which, from the miniitia3 introduced 
into it, would seem to be the result of contem- 
porary observation, if not the offspring of imagina- 
tion. "They lived," says our author,=^ "in their 
native wildness, amid the sublime solitudes of Ame- 
rica; now hunting the timid deer — now paddling 
the birch canoe — now dancing at their simple 
festivals — now going forth, painted and plumed for 
battle — or now, gathered around their council fires, 
to the grave debates of chiefs and warriors." And 
he might have gone on — " now kissing their wives 
— now smacking their lips — ^now eating their dinner 
— and now going without — now snoring asleep — 
now yelling awake" — and so on in the same strain 
for ever, with equal appositeness and with equal 
propriety. 

We will select from this first book jjesides, a 
sentence which contains a curious specimen of the 
metamorphosis of poetic beauty into prosaic non- 
sense. It occurs in a laboured parallel between 
Alaric (!) and De Soto, who should henceforth be 
doubtless considered notables in the history of 
Georgia. 

"Like Alaric, who ravaged the Roman empire, 
De Soto came from a far country to waste and to 
destroy. The one poured his barbarian hordes from 

* Page 44. 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 11 

the Alpine hills* over the plains and valleys of 
Italy ; the other, crossing the Atlantic with destruc- 
tion at Ills ijroio, and terror at Ms helm, desolated 
the fairest portions of the sunny South. "f 

Every one remembers the charming lines of 
Gray : — 

" Fair laughs the morn, and soft the zephyr blows, 
While proudly riding o'er the azure realm 
In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes; 

Youth on the prow ^ and Pleasure at the helmP 

Doctor Stevens has borrowed the poet's beautiful 
line, and marred it in the borrowing. He has 
served it, to use Sheridan's expression, " as gypsies 
do stolen children, disfiguring them to make 'em 
pass for their own." In the verses we have quoted, 
proio and helm refer to a ship — " the gilded vessel." 
In our author's paragraph, they either mean the 
proio and helm of the man — Ferdinand de Soto — 
or else must be turned adrift without any meaning 
at all. There is not a ship anywhere within sight 
of them. 

If Doctor Stevens had been a Welshman, we 
might have supposed he meant by De Soto's proio 

* The author probably means the Alps : which, as is well known, are 
among the loftiest mountains in Europe, 
t Page 25. 



12 OBSERVATIONS ON DR.STEVENS'S 

— his hroio ; helm being a poetical fonn for helmet. 
As it now stands, the sentence certainly has no 
meaning in English. 

The propriety of occuj^ying fifty-five octavo pages 
of a history of Georgia in what is strangely enough 
called Anfe-colomal liistonj — that is, no history at 
all — is somewhat problematical. It is, nevertheless, 
no small proof of talent, that a man should be able 
to write fifty-five octavo pages of a State's lilstonj, 
hefore there was any State, and consequently before 
there was any history. 

But this consideration evidently did not enter 
into the question. The object being to make a 
book, fifty-five octavo pages on any subject what- 
ever were not to be disregarded. 

One of the most striking peculiarities of this book 
is the talent for Am])lification it displays. True, not 
a single subject is made to appear more dignified 
or important; but — ^like stretched India rubber — 
tenuity of sul^stance increases in exact proportion 
to extension of surface ; and the sense is often lost 
in diffuseness of phraseology. 

"When tea is over diluted, the mixture is called 
slop; and when little sense is dressed up in very 
many and very big words, the composition is called 
twaddle. Thus twaddle is a sort of literary slop. 



HISTORY OF CxEORGIA. 13 

But they differ in this — that slop is apt to produce 
repletion before satiety ; while with twaddle, satiety 
precedes repletion. Or to state it less abstractly, — 
a man may, on occasion, drink slop till he can hold 
no more, without being satiated; but that a man 
should not get enough of Doctor Stevens's history 
of Georgia, before he gets to the end of it, we 
conceive to be impossible. 

The ship which brought the first colonists to 
Georgia, sailed from England, November 17th, 1732, 
and arrived at Charleston, January 13th, 1733. This 
is a plain statement of a plain fact. It is, moreover, 
all that is known about that fact. But it makes 
only one brief sentence ; and nothing less than half 
a page would suit our author. If such a chance 
for amplification was neglected, how was a bulky 
octavo to be eked out, price two dollars and fifty 
cents ? So he tells us that a ship's j^rogress at sea 
is not measured by milestones ! — in other words, 
that a ship does not sail on a turnpike road ! — and 
more to the same purpose. 

"The ship sailed the next day, November 17th, 
1732, from Gravesend, skirted slowly along the 
southern coast of England, and, taking its departure 
from Scilly light, spread out its ivhite sails to the 
of the Atlantic. 

" Day after day, and week after loeeh, the voyagers 



14 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS'S 

seem the centre of tlie same watery circle, canojned 
hy the same hending shy. No milestones tell of 

THEIR PROGRESS. TlIE WAYMARKS OF THE MARINER 
ARE THE SUN BY DAY, AND THE MOON AND STARS BY 

NIGHT; no hindred sliip answers hach its red-cross 
signal; hut there they float, the germ of a future 
nation, upon the desert ivaters. Sailing a circuitous 
route, they did not reach the coast of America until 
the 13th of January, 1733, when they cast anchor 
in Rebellion Roads, and furled their sails at last in 
the harbour of Charleston.'"^' 

The sails appear to have changed owners during 
the voyage. When it commenced, we are told they 
belonged to the ship; and now, at its end, to the 
passengers. 

There is about this book a queer originality — a 
characteristic perfectly unique. What it states un- 
truly, is absurdly untrue; and even what it states 
truly, is absurdly true. Witness those milestones. 

One more specimen must suffice. The author 
wishes to apprise us of the fact that in the first 
Synagogue established in Savannah, religious service 
was performed in Hebrew. Two words express the 
idea, but two words go but a small way to make 
an octavo. Amplification is, therefore, as usual 
resorted to ; and an inflated periphrasis is produced, 

* Page 87. 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 15 

extending over five lines. This, to be sure, does 
not increase the volume much : but it increases it 
far more than two words woukl have done. And 
then — the ocean is made up of drops. 

" True to their ancient faith, and zealous for the 
worship of the ' God of Israel,' they no sooner landed 
on our shores"'^ than they resolved to open a syna- 
gogue, to which they gave the name of Mickva 
Israel. A room was obtained and fitted up for the 
purpose . . . . Li this temporary liouse^ of God, divine 
service was regularly performed, and the great 'I 
AM' loas iDorsliipped in the same language in lohich 
Abraham, Isaac a)id Jacob prayed ; lohlch ivas heard 
on /Sinai, and in the gorgeous Temple of Solomon ; and 
in which the inspired men of God poured forth tlwir 
suhlime and far-seeing prophecies ''\ 

We meet frequently — indeed, one can hardly open 
the book without finding — such phrases as these : 
"Their icars were seldom fair-fought fields ;"\ "The 
earth has been almost girdled with the lovefeasts of 
his disciples" 1 1 — a sort of girdle, by the way, some- 
what more wonderful than even the celebrated cestus 
of Venus — " Let us not spread on the grave page of 

* Query — what shores does the author mean ? The shores of Massa- 
chusetts, or the shores of Geoi-gia? Pennsylvania has no shores. 

•j- This sudden metamorphosis of a room into a house is certainly as 
remarkable an event as any in the Hebrew history. 

% Pages 368, 369. I Page 53. || Page 342. 



16 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS'S 

history the juvenile follies of those two noble States."* 
This sj)reading of juvenile follies after the manner of 
a plaster, is rather a novel mode of treating "the 
grave page of history;" but it reminds us very plea- 
santly of the Doctor's original vocation ; or, as the 
vulgar saying hath it, it smells of the shop. " Before 
marriage great looseness of virtue prevailed. "f Is 
Doctor Stevens really ignorant, that a loose woman 
is not a virtuous woman ? that looseness is the very 
reverse of virtue ? 

But it would be tedious to detail the manifold 
blunders of every kind which pervade the book — 
vulgar colloquialisms, such as, " Where have they 
gone ?"J for wJdther—eYTOYS in grammar — errors in 
the use of words. They are so frequent, that it is 
scarcely hyperbolical to say, that to enumerate them 
all would be nearly equivalent to reprinting the 
book. 

We are next to notice Doctor Stevens's misstate- 
ments, and mistakes in regard to facts — some of them, 
of common historical notoriety. A few examples 
will be sufficient ; and the inference from them seems 
unavoidable. If an author misstates facts so noto- 
rious as these — facts which ought to be as familiar 
to a man of letters as household Avords — what 
security have we that his other assertions are not 

* Page 13ti. t Page 53. J Page 28. 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 17 

equally erroneous? and how is it possible to esteem 
his work as an authority ?* 

On one of the first pages, under the title of 
ERRATA, the author exonerates the printer from all 
mistakes affecting meaning, (except one, which we 
have not noticed,) thereby assuming for himself the 
responsibility for the statements in the text. We 
mention this to prevent any suspicion of the errors 
being typographical. 

" The treaty of Utrecht," says Doctor Stevens, 
"inl711"!-j* There is many a little schoolgirl who 
could have told him that this famous treaty was 
made in 1713. 

He informs us that by the convention of the 14th 
of January, 1739, between Great Britain and Spain, 
"^^ it was declared with regard to the disputed terri- 
tories of Great Britain and Spain, in Georgia, that 
things shall remain in the situation they are in at 
present, without increasing the fortifications there, or 
making any new post."J Now the stipulation really 
was, "that within six weeks two plenipotentiaries 
from each side should meet at Madrid, to regulate 
the pretensions of the two Crowns, as to rights of 

* We wish it to be distinctly understood, that we do not give a list of 
errors, but only a few specimens : — such as present themselves on a cursory 
perusal. f Page 286. % Page 160. 



18 OBSERVATIONS ON DK. STEVENS'S 

trade, and as to the limits of Georgia and Florida; 
that their conferences should finish within eight 
months; and that in the meantime no progress should 
be made in the fortifications of either province.'"'' 

This is clearly a very different view of the case 
from that presented by Doctor Stevens; but the 
convention was concluded during the administration 
of Walpole, whose pacific policy, strangely enough, 
does not seem to meet with this Reverend person's 
approbation. It is doubtless very interesting to the 
public to know that Doctor Stevens thinks Sir Robert 
Walpole a ^^ splendid minisferial j)cii'adox' .'-f 

Doctor Stevens speaks of the treaty of Seville as 
having been concluded in 1730. J It was concluded 
in 1729. 

He says that " the forces of England under 
Vernon and Wentworth were aiming at the reduc- 
tion of Havana.,"§ during the war with Spain. The 
fact is, that they attacked Carthagena in 1741, and 
landed in Cuba, with a view of reducing /Santiago, 
in July, 1742, but neither threatened nor attacked 
Havana. 

He tells us that war was declared by Great 
Britain against Spain, on the 22d of October, 
1739. II It was declared on the 19th of October. 

He informs us that Oglethorpe was born on the 

* See Mahon. Hist, of England, vol. ii. pp. 409, 410. 

I Page 208. | Page l-")9. ^ Page IH] || Page IGl . 



HISTORY OF GEORGIA. 19 

21st of December, at a country-seat bought by his 
father, Sir Theophilus, after a visit to " the exiled 
king," James the Second, at Saint Germains.* Now 
James, so far from being at Saint Germains he/ore the 
21st of December, was at that time still in England, 
at Rochester. 

He asserts, that on the committee appointed by the 
House of Commons, in 1728, to inquire into the state 
of the EngUsh gaols, were " some of the first men in 
England ; among them . . . Admiral Vernon, and Field- 
Marshal Wade."f Now Vernon was not an Admiral 
until 1739, nor Wade a Field-Marshal until 1745. 

He says that Colonel Palmer and his troops were 
dreadfully surprised at Fort Moosa, during the siege 
of St. Augustine. J Mr. Spalding, whose authority is 
conclusive on the subject, in his Life of Oglethorpe, 
sajT^s expressly — " Tliey ivere not surjmsed"^ 

We next meet with a most extraordinary statement 
of a still more remarkable fact — a fact, too, which has 
had the strange fortune of escaping not only the in- 
vestigations of historians, but the observation of con- 
temporaries, — to be brought to light in the year of our 
Lord 1847, in the History of Georgia, by the learned 
researches of the Reverend William Bacon Stevens, 
M. D., Professor of Belles Lettres, Histori/(!), etc., in 

* Pages 76, 77. f Page 60. + Page 173. 

§ Collections of the Geo. Hist. Society, vol. i. p. 2S1. 



20 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS'S 

tlie University of Georgia : — since, emigrated home- 
wards. 

Oglethorpe's " first effort in tlie British Senate was 
in 1723, against the motion for the banishment of 
Francis Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester. The hishoj), 
on the death of Queen Anne, had, in f\dl canonicals, 
and in the city of London, proclaimed Charles Stuart, 
King of Great Britain' ! ! ! * 

If this latter sentence is introduced in this con- 
nexion for any purpose at all, it must be to assign a 
reason for the Bishop's impeachment; to state the 
crime of which he was accused. In other words, the 
author wishes us to believe, that a man who publicly, 
'' in full canonicals, and in the city of London," pro- 
claimed the Pretender, King of Great Britain, in 1714, 
was not arraigned for such a glaring offence until 
1723 — nine years after iva rds : this very man, too, 
being allowed in the mean time to officiate conspicu- 
ously at the Coronation of George the First,']- and to 
hold the distinguished stations of Bishop of Rochester 
and Dean of Westminster unmolested ! 

Every one who has the slightest acquaintance with 
the history of those times, is aware that Atterbury 
was really charged with " carrying on a traitorous 

* Page 82. 

f As Dean of Westminster. See Lodge, Illust. Pers. folio, vol. iv. art. 
Atterbury. 



HISTORY OP GEORGIA. 21 

correspondence, in order to raise an insurrection in 
the kingdom, and to procure foreign Princes to in- 
vade it." 

But further : we are told in this astonishing para- 
graph that the Bishop " proclaimed Charles Stuart, 
King of Great Britain" ! Is it possible that a " Pro- 
fessor of Belles Lettres, and History,'' does not know 
what it would disgrace any Fresliman to he ignorant 
of — that the Pretender's name was James ? — and that 
his son, the young Pretender, with whom alone even 
the grossest carelessness could confound him, was not 
born till six years after this alleged proclamation of 
Atterbury's ? 

This event, now first published to the world by 
Doctor Stevens, never took i^lace ! We will however 
give, in the words of Lord Mahon, the report upon 
which Doctor Stevens probably based his fabrication. 

" We are, indeed, assured that Atterbury, immedi- 
ately on the Queen's demise, proposed to Bolinghrol-e 
to ATTEMPT proclaiming James at Charing Cross ; and 
offered himself to head the procession in his lawn 
sleeves. But Bolingbroke, shrinking from an enter- 
prise so desperate, with the majority of the Council 
and the Executive Government against them, the 
Bishop is said to have exclaimed, with an oath, 
' There is the best cause in Europe lost for want of 
spirit !' "* 

* Hist, of England, vol. i. p. l.'?8. 



22 OBSERVATIONS ON DR. STEVENS'S 

But lest this should prove insufficient to convince 
his readers of the extent of his ignorance, he lugs in 
the unfortunate House of Stuart again a second time^ 
and succeeds, if possible, in outblundering himself. 

"On the declaration of war," he writes, "with 
England by France, (March 4th, 1744,) and the 
threatened invasion of England b}^ a large force under 
Count Saxe, for the purpose of enforcing the claims 
to the throne of the Gliei-aUer de St. George, eldest son 
of diaries Edimird" die* 

Thus he makes a man his own son, or else his own 
grandfither ! 

Chevalier St. George was the incognito title of both 
the old Pretender, James, and his son, Charles Ed- 
ward, the young Pretender. Charles Edward was 
not married until 1772, and, as is well known, left 
no son ; much less one who had claims to the throne 
in 1744! 

We venture to say that these blunders evince a 
degree of ignorance, to which historical literature 
cannot furnish a parallel. 

That a man who pretends to the character of a 
scholar — a Professor, moreover, of Belles Lettres, and 
History — should be so excessively ignorant of com- 
mon English history, is rather a singular circum- 
stance in itself : but that he should choose the History 
of Georgia to make an ostentatious display of that 

* Page 208. 



HISTORY 0¥ GEORGIA. 23 

ignorance, is indeed amazing. And it would be al- 
most inexplicable to one who was not acquainted 
with this heterogeneous and grotesque medley of 
gleanings — a History in name, in reality a Common- 
place book. 

We have often met with ignorance ; but never be- 
fore with ignorance that voluntarily obtruded itself 
upon public notice, or that thrust forth its nakedness 
with such marvellous effrontery. 

UjDon the whole, then, the review of Doctor Ste- 
vens's work, leads we think to two inevitable con- 
clusions : 

First. — That he cannot write History. 

Second. — That he cannot write English. 

But we have compassion upon his inexperience; 
and shall therefore repeat some advice, which he 
would do well to profit by. 

" Whenever you have written anything wdiich you 
think particularly fine — strike it out." 

Observance of this advice will certainly diminish 
the bulk of his volumes, and cannot diminish their 
value. 



APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX 



" The course which the Society ought to have 
adopted, ajopears to us quite clear. The first years 
of its existence, and the first fruits of its income 
should have been exclusively devoted to the collec- 
tion of original materials. When these had become 
sufiiciently numerous to aftbrd a selection — based 
upon a comparison of their relative value — the most 
interesting and important among the official and 
other Manuscripts, should have been chosen for 
publication. 

" Such a volume, composed of authentic and pre- 
viously inaccessible documents, would indeed have 
been a precious addition to our historical literature. 

" This kind of material having been exhausted, 
the publication funds might next have been employed 
in reprinting a few of the rarest and most curious 
of the early tracts relating to the colony, in clirono- 
logical order ; and an imitation of the style of typo- 
graphy and general 'getting up' which distinguish 



28 APPENDIX. 

Mr. Force's valuable reprint of Historical Tracts, 
would certainly have given no cause for impeaching 
the Society's good taste. 

" Essays in elucidation of particular ^^arts of our 
history should have been invited, encouraged, and, 
when well executed, published among the collections. 

"At length, when the library had become com- 
plete in materials — manuscript and printed — when 
the attention of our citizens had been attracted, and 
their interest excited in the subject — when the 
talents of many of them had been employed in 
these essays upon it, some one should have then 
been appointed to digest these copious materials in 
one historical work. 

"The Society's action has been the reverse of 
this : it has begun where it should have ended." 

Extract from an Article on the Collections of the 
Georgia Historical Society, in Augusta Con- 
stitutionalist, August 2\st, 1849. 



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